Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1887-08-03
TO PAY ITS WAY.

The severe hand of this practical
age'of hard facts and coin is put forth
once more to:make Niagara Falls pay its
way. The conversion of'the forces of ma
ture into motive power for the'wheels of
commerce is not in this day checked by the
sentimental or poetical attaching to any
scene of beauty, or to the lofty grandeur
ot any stupenduous work of nature. The
age is altogether too hard-fsted and mer-
cenary for any loftier view by Buffalo
men of the mightiest waterfall upon
earth, than such as embraces schemes
for .enslaving its irresistible force to the
uses of unpoetic trade. We cannot sup
press the feeling Of regret or overcome the
sense Of disgust, that the great natural
-awe-inspiring wonder is to have its giant
feet fettered, and hereafter be made to
beat the bars of the treadmill in weary.
never-ending round.
Nature thus confined is the veriest Of
slaves, and the most pitiful of spectacles
Imagine Yosemite Falls hanessed to over
shot wheels, whose shafts and links clatter-
lng the walls of the loveliest valley of
ear:h, sacred to the loftiest inspirations of
which the soul is capable Of entertaining,
finally operate a saw-mill at the base of
that majestic pile of sheer-rising rock, the
grandest altar in all natures temples, FL
Captain. For one moment contemplate
the most improved and searching of Yam
kee washing machines in long series ar
rayed run by Bridal Veil Falls resplendent
shower, to do the laundrying for the tour
lists who come TO Yosemite to paw tribute
IT natures noblest shrine. Yet these. or
the entrapping of Nevada Fall to do the
mental work Of the kitchen, would not
more shock the sense of the fitness of
things, or more outrage the sacredness of
those marvellous works of nature than the
idea of Harvesting Niagara Falls to the
wheels of industry.
Yet this is precisely what is going to be
done. New York, after infinite trouble,
mas driven back the offensive shop and
booth, the peddler's cart and vagabonds'
peep-shows and the hundred -and-one
catch-penny concerns which fringed the
whole Niagara border The State, after
years OF striving, has at last sequestered
the immediate vicinity of the falls for a
park that the scenery Cd the great curios-
ity may no longer be impaired by such ex-
hibitions. Scarcely has that great work
been accomplished, when there comes a
Buffalo scheme that is well on the road to
success, and viii probably be carried out,
as the Buffalo Courier expresses it, to "wed
Niagara to the Buffalo BOOM
The Business Mems Association of Buff
falo Is at the bottom of this sacrilege, and
will probably accomplish it, and soon have
noble Niagara operating wheels and tur-
bine buckets, and hydraulic contrivances
ana electrical motors Of what order and in
what number no one can vet can tell, to
turn coffee mills and operate factories. pull
about cable cars, lift sugars and lower
hams to blow the sooty furnaces Of iron
works and rattle off editions of staid Bnf-
talo daily papers. 1t is thus that the prac-
teal, thrifty, penny-turning Bufialonians
propose to knock the poetry out of Niagara
and prevent mighty smart water
privilege from longer running to waste.